Bug

I remember this day because it was the day I was rescued from almost certain death.

When I was in third grade, my best friend was Paige Gutzman.  She and I would always spend recess walking around the big field behind the school--telling stories, finding roly-poly bugs to put into jars with lady bugs, peeling the grass into smaller pieces, and only sometimes joining in with other games.

Paige and I were walking around the field when I heard a dozen girls screaming my name and running towards me.  I don't know what they were yelling- Run? Hide? They are coming?!  I'm not exactly sure.  I just know they were telling me I was in trouble.

That was when I heard the other thundering footsteps.

I looked to the school.   It was like it was happening in slow motion--There was thirty, third grade boys running around the portables, coming from behind them, and then turning toward the field where I was standing.  They were running at me!  (ok, so maybe there were only like 15 boys... but it felt like a lot more...)  The rest of the girls fled, and I had no clue what was going on.  I tried to run but was overtaken by the sprinting boys and surrounded.

They circled around and then began taunting me--they had killed a large preying mantis and had gutted it (boys are gross!!!) and proceeded to hold a stick with bug guts out towards my face.  This is where I would die.  I was certain of it.

However, I was saved before my imminent death arrived--one boy began moving through all the rest of the crowd clamoring for my screams, and he began to push them all away from me.   I was rescued. 

Jon Beh.  

I will always remember him as the boy who saved me from an early grave. Or at least from a very traumatizing experience for a third grade girl.